The founder of the Christian human rights charity China Aid, Bob Fu, told Premier over 223,000 Christians were persecuted last year, which is four times more than the previous year.

China Aid’s documented Christian human rights violations also doubled last year and the number of people detained reached 3,700.

“As a Christian you’re always being seen as a suspicious force,” Fu said. “Christianity is portrayed as a foreign, western religion, being suspected [as] a foreign infiltration force to subvert the state power of the Communist Party.”

The crackdown on Christians in China has meant that crosses have been removed from churches, churches have been demolished, and Christians suspected of worshipping at home have been detained.

A house church Christian in China’s southern Guangdong province was recently blacklisted from employment after being arrested for his faith.

Fu said: “Some officials even force themselves to stay in Christian homes overnight to prevent them from midnight secret worship services. We have never seen this kind of extreme persecution since the end of the Cultural Revolution.”

However, Fu said the reason the crackdown has been getting increasingly worse in the past five years is because the number of Christians in China is rapidly growing.

He said that according to a secret government document that China Aid obtained after the government launched…

The call follows a YouGov study published on World Sleep Day that found that over a third of workers have sleepless nights due to financial difficulties and debt.

Jim Goodchild from Christians Against Poverty told Premier how sleep loss can be a good sign that help is needed.

“It’s natural sometimes… if we have something difficult to perhaps have a night or two where we struggle to sleep,” he said during Premier’s News Hour.

“But if that’s a persistent thing – that our worries are getting on top of us – it’s really important that people seek the help that they need.”

The NHS warns the mental effects after several sleepless nights can be serious, with a risk to wellbeing as well as effectiveness at work.

The research conducted on behalf of credit information provider, Equifax, also found that sleeplessness has the biggest impact on people earning between £30,000 and £34,999 per year, with 65 per cent of this group saying it has negatively affected their performance at work.

Workers in the £10,000 to £14,999 bracket were least likely to be worried about poor performance at work as a result of sleeplessness.

Goodchild highlighted the importance of Christians helping people struggling financially.

He explained: “A lot of people feel a real stigma around talking about money and their finances and financial difficulties.

“I think the thing that we can do if we know…

I Can Only Imagine tells the emotional backstory of the song with the same name by Christian rock band MercyMe.

Lead singer, Bart Millard wrote the song after losing his father as a teen.

He experienced a difficult upbringing brought on by his mother’s desertion and father’s abuse.

He told USA Today that part of the song’s appeal was that it – instead of “shoving the Bible down people’s throats” – used God to simply question the nature of death.

He explained: “I’m asking the same question many people have wondered, whether you go to church or not, like, ‘ok, God, if this turns out to be real, if we die and we get (to heaven), how am I going to respond?’

“There’s no answers in that song, it’s all questions.”

The Texas-based group released the song in 2001 and it went on to sell 2.5 million copies around the world. Its popularity peaked in the aftermath of the 11th September terrorist attacks in the US.

The film, which is directed by Andrew Erwin and Jon Erwin, is being released in 1,626 theatres.

Early tracking by BoxOffice Pro suggests the movie could follow in the song’s successful footsteps as its heading for a strong opening – near the $1.5 million mark – and it could end its run with $3 million or more.

Stay up to date with the latest news stories from a Christian perspective. Sign up to our daily newsletter and receive more stories like this straight to your…